About

Data science is the creation and application of powerful new methods to collect, curate, analyze, and make discoveries from large-scale data.

Big data often refers to the massive amounts of complex information that are difficult to manipulate and understand using traditional processing methods. Data science is focused on the concepts, methods, and applications for extracting meaning from big data—it has become one of the emerging disciplines of the 21st century.

The Vista Collaboratory in Carlson Library is equipped with an interactive, tiled-display wall that can render massive data sets in real time, giving researchers and data scientists the ability to visualize and analyze complex data instantaneously and collaboratively with colleagues and students. The lab creates the immersive visual experience necessary to allow researchers to understand and manipulate large and complex sets of scientific information.

Although we have the tools to access huge amounts of information, we now need to develop and wield new and better ones to lead us to optimized decisions in almost any human endeavor. In doing so, we can better understand and, ideally, solve some of the greatest challenges facing the world today in medicine and health, energy and the environment, economics and politics, and many other areas.

Today, the digital revolution is creating unforeseen new opportunities, especially for those whose decision-making most expertly taps the vast information resources that are now at our disposal. The possibilities are huge and can help lead to answers to some of biggest questions in medicine and health, energy and the environment, economics and politics, and beyond. Data science is transforming science, business, and our everyday lives.

Rochester researchers are using data science to further their work in health analytics and cognitive science and artificial development, and to develop new methods, tools, and infrastructures.